The Best Find

It doesn't look like much does it?  It's just a simple portable cabinet light.  But it really is the best find.  We stopped at Home Depot on the way home from the health club on Black Friday.  Roger needed some wood and a plumbing elbow.  I made a beeline to the house plants. 

On the way, you really had to do some fancy footwork to avoid running into a display of LED lights.  They were packaged, two small flashlights and two headlamps.  I glanced at the packages and quite literally the light went on inside my head. 

Several years ago, I found this rather unremarkable and slightly dull "paperweight" at an estate sale.  One of our sons likes paperweights so I thought that he might make a place for it in his room.  It was priced at only a dollar or two.  The price reflected the fact that it was not too highly desirable. 

Even this picture shows it to better advantage.  We could see a couple large, dark bubbles in it and some kind of bubbly swish and that was about it.  That is until one of our sons decided to shine a flashlight up from the bottom. 

It was not a paperweight.  It was a piece of glass art and very arty glass art at that.  Since that discovery, we have been looking for small uplights or something that would illuminate the inside of the glass.  If worst came to worst, we decided that we could make a little stand with a small flashlight light bulb.  But making this stand seemed like a large, not too easy task so the glass art sat on the desk acting like a paperweight. 

When I saw the LED headlight, I ran to the electrical supplies area at Home Depot and carefully examined everything there.  I came up with the little cabinet light.  It looked about the right diameter so it hopped into my  shopping basket. 

As you can see, the little light is just the right size.  It looks like it was made for the glass. 

The final picture shows how the light lights up the glass.  You must keep a couple things in mind.  I am taking a picture of light and while we have a nice camera, it is not a professional camera and I do not have the lighting to make a really spectacular picture.  The color of the light came out yellow.  I PhotoShopped the picture to make it whiter.  The picture is not as sharp and clear as real life.  The large bubbles are a little dim and the swish of tiny bubbles is not quite as sharp.  I think you can get a general idea of what the glass looks like. 

One Pocket Done

I thought you might like to see that I have completed one of the two pockets. 

As I speak, uhhhmmmm, uhm, uhm, as I write???  No, as I key this message, it is in the post and on its way to its intended owner who will then, I think, decorate it and give it to its ultimate owner.  Now, how is that for a journey? 

Our Thanksgiving was the usual, for us, just the four of us.  The green beans turned out wonderful and I will serve them for the extended family Christmas dinner.  The wild rice pilaf needs to be tweaked so I will not serve it, maybe another year.  It is so very good to be able to try out new things in a situation where nothing is riding on the outcome. 

Our snow was gone except for the odd pile or two on Thanksgiving day.  There is still just a little left.  It rained this morning and may snow tonight.  All in all, our temperatures have been unseasonably warm.  Depending upon where you live, you might not think they are unseasonably warm, but we sure do. 

We did little shopping on Black Friday.  If you are not US residents, you might not know the significance of the name Black Friday.  In the US, the day after Thanksgiving is traditionally a big shopping day.  I do not know how much of it is customer driven and how much is retailer driven but it is a big shopping day, so much so, that some claim it is the day the retailers' books shift from red ink to black ink. 

We shopped at one of the home improvement stores on the way home from the health club.  We went in for a length of lumber and a plumbing elbow.  I checked out the house plant section because I wanted a little wintergreen plant I had seen.  Then I had an idea for which I needed a small spotlight which I found.  I need to try to take pictures of it to show this to you because I simply cannot describe it.  At the checkout counter, we found out that their holiday promotional was a nice poinsettia for 1.00 USD.  All of that popped into our shopping basket, a grand total of not very much. 

Thanksgiving Blessings to All

Sometimes it is difficult to remember to be thankful for all of our blessings.  Food takes such a central position in Thanksgiving that it tends to overshadow everything else.  I guess that I willingly fall into that trap. 

Yesterday afternoon I made almond krokant for the salad and toasted almonds for the green beans.  This morning I made the cranberry sauce and simmered dried cranberries in a bit of the liquid from the sauce for the green beans.  Earlier this week I roasted some of the pumpkins we grew and prepared pumpkin purée.  Today it went into a pumpkin pie.  The turkey is in the oven.  Really and truly, I can hardly wait to eat. 

I have been working on a couple fabric pockets. 
I cut the fabric and am ready to begin stitching the pockets together. 

A Day of Experiences

Snow was predicted for today with an accumulation of 1-3 inches by evening.  This is the first accumulation snowfall of the year.  It will not last because next week the temperature will climb to at least 40° F.  This is quite late for a first snowfall. 

At the moment, the sky is very heavily overcast.  This morning at 4:50 or so a.m., the sky was not overcast.  If it had been, I would not have been able to see the most spectacular Leonid meteor.  Most meteors show just a faint streak of light.  This one was phenomenal.   I have never seen such a spectacular meteor and expect to not see one again. 

It is just past the peak of the Leonid Meteor Shower but that did not prevent this one from showing up.
The Perseid Meteor Shower  in August usually puts on a good show too. 

Last but not least, this afternoon, we discovered a red squirrel in the attic.  It looked like it wanted to find a way out.  We have set out a live trap bated with peanut butter.  If the squirrel will go into the trap, we will take it outside and let it go.  I wonder if this is one of the eight Drain Pipe Boys of the summer.  I also wonder how it got inside.  We really need to block that passage. 

Work Resumes: The Pockets

Do you remember when I posted these pictures? 

It seems so long ago that I cannot remember when it was. 
I used the fabrics shown in the picture to the right to make the pockets. 
I was ready to finish the pockets when I was sent a project that took priority.  I could not find the time to finish the pockets. 

I will resume the construction.  The pockets are almost finished and have been like this for a little more than a month.  The band on the brown pocket needed some serious remedial work.  When I began to cut it, I unfortunately started to cut it on the intended fold line.    :-(   
After thinking it over, I finished cutting it on both fold lines and stitched ribbon over the cut edges.  It seems to me like a fairly good save. 

Next on the list is two plain, undecorated pockets. 

One will be the red pin dot with the green holiday print to line it.  The second one is Chocolate  -  Chocolate  -  Chocolate.  The pink stripe will be the outside.  I only wish that I could have gotten green stripe but pink is better than nothing. 

Gift Time

Catherine and I were paired in the Blackbird Designs Exchange.  I thoroughly enjoyed stitching for my partner, Catherine.  She also lives in Minnesota and we decided to meet about half way between our homes to have lunch and exchange our gifts.  First of all, Catherine discovered that we have a mutual friend.  Next we discovered that our paths actually crossed in the mid 1990's. 

Catherine attended all of the Spirit of Cross Stitch events in Des Moines, Iowa.  A friend of mine and I attended two of the events, in 1993 and 1994.  A needlework shop in St.Paul sponsored a bus to the event and made arrangements with a motel in Des Moines for accommodations during the event.  We all went to Des Moines on the bus together. 

When we met, Catherine and I did not recognize each other but then I think we did not expect to.  It was just a nice time to get to know a new friend. 

I expect that you want to know what Catherine and I gave each other. 

This is the box that I made for Catherine.  I stitched Woodland Berries and lined the inside of the lid with it.  I painted, distressed, and waxed the box; I have shown you pictures of the work on the box.  You can go back into previous posts to see them.  I also included some gifts that I put into the box, none of which are shown in the picture.  For the picture, I just popped some of my stitching and sewing things into the box to add a little visual interest. 

Here is the lovely sewing book that Catherine made for me.  You can see how nice it goes with my old plate and the old fashioned print fabric.  I have it on a table where I can see it while I stitch.  It makes my heart sing. 

The send date for the exchange is 15 November.  We are all done; we both have our gift and it isn't even 15 November yet.  We are congratulating ourselves for successfully completing the exchange. 

Stitching Continues

This is Vibrant Woodland from Amaryllis Artworks.  I finished it a couple weeks ago and am trying to find the time to mount it in a box.  It is for one of my nieces. 

I have begun a second design from Amaryllis Artworks for her sister.  I am trying very hard to finish the boxes before the end of the year.  They were intended to be high school graduation gifts.  But - - - The younger one graduated from college this summer. 

My life has just become a little more complicated and I have a little less free time.  Friday I received a new model from Just Cross Stitch.  I need to return it finished by the end of the first week in November so they have enough time to have it framed.  Eek, that is almost as much work as it sounds like.  One good thing is that it seems to be stitching up quite easily.  I am not certain when or even if I can ever show it to you.   

Do you want to see the last design I stitched for JCS?  Sampler of Psalms Part I came out in the November/December issue.  I stitched all of it with the exception of two floral motifs, the cross, and one group of 5 small Algerian eyes, all of which are in the spot sampler section.  When I got the first part of the chart, the design was not yet completed.  I love the way they framed it.